In a blink, the bits enclosed them in a glittering sphere. Tiny, deadly balls of light burst all around them, each explosion bringing a thousand red-hot embers raining down. Berd screamed each time they came in contact with her flesh. She smelt her clothes burning, her hair singeing, and blood in the air. A large ball of energy, glowing silver, blazed towards her face. There was no avoiding it. This was it. The end.
She was going to die.
Chapter Seven
BERD SCREAMED AS the ball of energy flamed towards her.
A strong hand yanked her back. The glowing silver ball sliced the air in half, barely missing her cheek. The distinctive smell of burnt metal trailed after it. Smoke scorched her throat, settling in her lungs like lead. A hundred bits shot past on the trail of the first.
Each time a bit’s tiny feet clawed at her, a streak of radiant white light erupted, blinding her even with her eyes shut. She dropped to her knees to avoid them but it didn’t help. Writhing in agony, she huddled closer to the ground as Charles covered her with his body.
As suddenly as it had started, the pinging and the bangs stopped.
Silence.
She felt weight lift from her, as he rose to his feet.
“Are you all right, my lady? Are you all right?” Charles’s voice echoed in the vacuum. His arms were around her, protective, helping her stand.
Wary, she lifted her gaze. The space around the buildings was clear, and the only evidence of the assault was the lingering taste of blood, smoke, and metal in the air. But the bits were gone.
A small, nervous cry left her throat. She rounded on Charles – the cause of it all – but then she saw him...
His face was blackened, his outfit scorched and singed. Blood dripped freely from his fingers and nose, and spattered onto the green-enamelled ground.
The next thing he did surprised her even more. He touched her gently on the shoulder as if she were an injured child, more concerned about her injuries than his. It made no sense for him to act this way, especially after his ill-treatment of her.
“Are you all right?” he repeated.
She pulled away from him. “How could you summon them!”
Guilt flashed over his face before he whipped his hand back and straightened. “Normally, they’re fine. I simply wanted to show you something about the Engine. The lightning must have caused the bits to be filled with more electricity than usual. That’s all.”
This was more like the Charles she was used to. “We. Were. Attacked, Mr Fotheringay. Attacked. We could have been killed.”
Unexpectedly, his face softened. “Yet you darted inside the circle.”
He was staring at her with such intensity that Berd shifted her feet uncomfortably. “Well, someone had to rescue you, Mr Fotheringay.”
He arched one brow at the formality of her address, and then his expression grew serious. “I admit I made a mistake. I invited them over, not knowing the consequences. There was a slight delay in their responding to my change of direction, but you covered your face, so it’s mostly your hands and arms that were injured. Actually...”
He tapped a finger against his mouth as he flicked a glance up and down her, an assessment as impartial as if she were an autocar. Despite the clinical nature of his perusal, Berd felt heat rise to her throat.
“Just as I thought! It was because your garments were soaked from working with the battery beasts that you suffered a little more than was to be expected.”
To her annoyance, he was right. Her garments had taken the brunt of the assault, but that was not the point. By now she was seething. Tired and miserable, the last thing she wanted was to engage in an intellectual debate as to whose fault it was, especially when it was obvious.
“You asked to help,” he reminded her gently.
Had a battery beast been within grasp, she would have flung it at him. Charles had known the task, and had known she was wet, and yet still, he had commanded the bits over.
He knew the land.
He may not have known the bits were overflowing with electricity, but the point was he knew they were filled with electricity. This latest incident proved she could not trust him. Though she had no idea how, she was determined to make her way out without him.
She glared at him. “Thank you for your assistance, Mr Fotheringay, in ill circumstances you created. From here on, I shall be able to manage perfectly.”
Charles groaned through gritted teeth as if she had pushed him to his limits. “My lady, just stop your lecture and give me a minute, please.”
Berd held no sympathy for him. After what he had made her suffer, if she could push some more, she would, but she waited, readying herself to punch him if he tried anything untoward.
“All right, this is what we’ll do.” His voice was softer. “You will be fine, do not fear. It was more the shock of minor electrocution you felt. Now if you please, hold out your right hand.” From a fold in his suit, he pulled out a small receptacle.
Light brown, round and leathery, it looked like a bladder. It was also ten inches in diameter.
The battery bugs...
She cringed and looked to him, taking for confirmation the fact his face tightened and that he would not meet her eyes.
“Well, princess? Are you too proud to accept a local remedy? This isn’t from Harley Street.” He untied the bladder as he waited for her decision.
She was a fool to even think he was going to apologise. If it wasn’t for the fact her burns were throbbing so violently, she would have ignored him and gone her way. Reluctantly, she held out one hand.
The drop he poured onto the first burn dazzled in its radiance. At first it felt as if he were pouring cool water onto her hand, except it looked like...
Liquid sunlight.
Hissing smoke issued from the wound.
She would have jumped back, had he not grasped her hand and held it steady. Her whole body grew warm and her heart sped up. Then she gasped. Her palm felt as though worms were crawling under her skin! She opened her mouth to protest, but he held up a finger.
“Wait and watch.” His eyes, almost silver through the smoke, sparkled with confidence.
When the smoke cleared, she examined her hand. The burn was healed. “I— I— don’t believe this.”
In answer, he poured a drop each onto the remaining two burns. Hissing, smoke, crawling, and then her hand was healed. With a solemn smile, he indicated for her to hold out her other hand.
An unnatural buzzing throbbed in her veins as if her blood were thicker. Then her skin started itching and she knew what was in the flask.
Energy from the river.
Pure energy. That must have been how he managed to stay alive and how he had gotten his powers. And if she drank it, no doubt she would get them, too. Other creatures had also imbibed of the energy.
The moths.
The moths she had removed from the Engine in the stable.
Each time she turned the Engine on, the vacuum tubes glowed. Insects were attracted to light and the charge must have somehow affected them. In turn the eggs the moths laid must have become the battery bugs. She should have noticed that the battery bugs bore slight traces of wingless silver moths.
Silver moths whose fat bellies swirled with energy.
The energy had mutated them.
She grimaced, and linked both hands behind her. “No, thank you. No more energy for me, please, I do not wish to be experimented upon.”
Charles, who had been waiting for her to hold up her other hand, took a step back, aghast. “Princess, I have created a device to help mankind. Not injure them. I am not Dr Frankenstein. My Engine is not a monster.”
How she wished she could believe him. Instead, an image fanned before her eyes: the battery bugs framed on the wall like a butterfly collection, followed by a hollow-eyed Charles pinned beside them. If he continued to partake of the energy, he would end up like them.
Before she could think further on it, a familiar whistle blew. To her delig
ht, it sounded like that of a train’s.
“Hurry! We must catch it.” He shoved the bladder into the fold in his suit and then held out his hand.
We must? He had said something similar regarding the bits. And look what happened. She needed proof before she followed blindly.
He could be mad. Or trying to kill her, because he thought she killed his father. She took a step back and placed her hands deliberately on her hips. “No.”
His outstretched hand faltered. “What?”
Again Berd debated whether to go with him or not. The train represented either safety or danger, and she needed to test the waters.
“I will come with you if you will refrain from drinking any more energy.” She held her breath, hoping he would agree.
He gave a small nervous laugh. “Are you serious?”
His God-like exterior was cracking. She nodded, more confident now she could see his discomfiture, pleased she had some power over him. “We are leaving soon, are we not? You won’t need the streams of energy.” Her heart pounded and she tried to keep her face impassive as she watched him slowly lower his hand.
The whistle shrilled again, angrily, urging them to hurry.
“Come on!” He pulled the bladder from his suit, tossed it to one side then grabbed her arm.
“Mr— ”
“Yes! Yes. Don’t you want to go home?” He flicked a glance heavenwards, as if beseeching it for patience.
In answer, she locked fingers with him. This train was the next step, and whether it represented safety or doom, either way, she was going to find out in a hurry.
They dashed down a golden alleyway, turned sharply left, ducked under the doorway of a brass building, and into a long, curving passageway. Though she had seen many of these buildings transform she had yet to enter one.
It was hard to believe this was really a train station. There were no plastered advertisements anywhere, but of course, she reminded herself there was no reason to have advertisements. There was no one for the advertisers to advertise to except her and Charles...
Her and Charles.
They were the sole inhabitants of this land. Human ones, anyway.
Berd swallowed, her throat dry, promising herself if she ever got home safely that she would never, ever, ever find fault with advertising again. Ever.
Around them, the walls were limed in glossy green tiles of various hues; the floors in contrasting buttercup yellow. The passageway rumbled with muted murmurs and comforting rattles, as if a distant train passed above.
She turned in wonder to the youth running beside her, but he merely pressed his lips together more tightly. The passageway split into two, and he took the right passageway. It beckoned them into a vast open space where pillars of iron arched skywards like the ribs of a gargantuan beast. Leadlight from the overhead dome strew the air with jewelled light: ruby, sapphire, topaz and emerald. Silence incensed the place.
If an angel descended from on high, she was sure it would feel at home. On holy ground.
They were in an underground train station, but one so lavish she would have believed Charles if he said they had taken the wrong turn and ended up in a cathedral. Or that decadently fabulous new invention: a department store.
I am in love.
And she was partners with the man who had created all of this.
At the moment, however, his priorities were not on the architecture. “Come on!” He tugged.
“It’s so beautiful,” she whispered, deliberately lagging so she could take in as much of the ethereal atmosphere of the station.
He frowned, clearly irritated with the delay. “Yes. You want to be left behind. There.” He pointed to the train waiting like a promise on the tracks.
Golden tracks.
Berd’s eyes widened. On those thin wires she had seen from the top of the building… a glorious, fire-breathing dragon of brass and steel crouched: the locomotive. At the end of the platform it waited, a chariot ready to ascend to the clouds, followed by a luxurious passenger carriage. Polished brass trucks curved into the shadowy darkness of the tunnel. Golden fenders gleamed provocatively at her. As they passed the locomotive, her wide-eyed reflection gazed back at her, trapped from within the shining prison of the boiler.
At the sight of her reflection, every nerve stood on end. With a pounding heart, she remembered the blocks, and her fear that the world would explode returned. But, as if the Engine itself were aware of her trepidation, the metal leviathan graciously exhaled, silently enveloping the platform in hot minty clouds that warmed her feet. She could almost believe she was once again catching a train at King’s Cross.
“Come on! Mustn’t miss it.”
Before she could object, Charles lifted her onto the top step of the passenger carriage. The floor felt as solid as his hands had been around her waist.
The train jerked forward, and she had to fling out her hands to avoid colliding against the walls. Cold metal caused a shiver to go through her, but it was reassuringly firm.
“Pick a compartment, my lady!” He scrambled up close behind.
She nodded and moved further in.
Down a slender hallway, there were doors to her left. She grasped the silver latch of the first door, again flinching at its icy coldness, but managed to lift it. It opened into a bare but spacious room, with a bed on her right. Straight ahead was a silver window, the green station walls opposite already sliding past.
He bowed, half-turning away. “Have a good res—”
“Wait! Where is the train taking us?” She couldn’t believe that he had expected her to go mildly into a cabin and wait for his instructions. Her suspicions were confirmed when his pale face creased in confusion.
“You’re sa— I mean— you want to go home, right?” he asked, his features relaxing slightly when she nodded.
“Well, we are. Going home that is. Rest, you must be exhausted. Rest and I’ll come for you when it’s time.” He dipped his head then moved on, his footsteps swiftly dying away.
She closed the door, slumped against it then replayed his words in her head. ‘You’re sa—’
What had he been about to reveal?
You’re safe?
Chapter Eight
BERD STARED INTO the room, collecting her thoughts. Her control over the situation seemed to be slipping away just as the view from the window slipped away. She wasn’t sure if she believed Fotheringay when he said they were going home, the fact he hadn’t finished his sentence increased her distrust of him.
Partners. Sure.
One thing he was right about, however – she was exhausted. Berd closed her eyes and inhaled deeply. The languid air inside the cabin tingled enticingly with the scent of peppermint. Opening her eyes, her gaze fell on the luxuriously soft white bed, the sole non-metallic thing in the room.
It looked so safe, it made her wonder if it really wasn’t.
She remembered the many transformations of the blocks of metal and groaned. Charles had said to rest. Again she was unsure if she could trust him on anything in this place. The bed... It looked soft. But its softness beckoned like Circe’s island of dreams, and she was not game to be Odysseus, the lost traveller, to test the bed in case it snapped shut like the leaves of a Venus Fly Trap. She had read about them in those awful Penny Dreadful stories ladies really shouldn’t be seen reading. Any longing dissipated as she imagined those lotus-like sheets wrapping drowsily around her like a tongue, and she never waking from that enchanted sleep.
The train continued to chug along, building up speed as it left the station behind. Her exhausted body alternately relaxed and tensed in the rhythm of its movement as she stood there, considering whether it was a prison cell or a princess’s chamber.
She dragged her gaze to the window, determined to strike out on her own. Charles said they were leaving, so logically they would head for the Output Section. If only she knew what it looked like.
They passed a red-arrowed sign.
It read ‘STORE’.
Her eyes widened.
Not the Output but the Store: not a commercial store like a grocery, but the storage like a silo. In a computer it was where the current program’s instructions were held in memory. He had said they were going home. It took a few seconds for the implication to register.
Charles had lied.
Sound and time passed like clouds over her. Then she hiccoughed and began breathing again. She rubbed and blew on her hands to warm them, but there was a deep hollowness inside her, as if she had lost something of value.
Charles had been deceiving her.
For too long she had been blind. The signs had probably been there from the beginning. It had all begun when she thought the Engine was dead.
How wrong she was.
With the battery bugs as receptacles, the Engine was alive. Barely alive, but alive like a man in a deep sleep, who to an observer, would at a distance appear dead until one came closer and saw the unmistakable signs of breathing. She was sure she knew what kept the Engine alive.
Energy.
It streamed in the rivers. It powered the Engine. It modified everything it touched.
The buildings. The moths. Charles.
And she had lain in the river, which meant that whatever happened to him would end up happening to her, for there was no sustenance inside the Engine. She did not know how long she would be able to hold out before she also partook. She licked her cracked lips sure thirst was already beginning to affect her ability to reason.
She had to get out.
Berd removed the pins from her hair, then finger-combed her tangled tresses off her face. The rhythmic movement brought her breathing back to normal. Except for the slight jostling of the carriages and the ever-present hum, she heard nothing. Charles could be in the next compartment or carriage or even off the train by now. She should have asked for a map when she had the chance.
She opened the door and slipped out. Red and yellow flames burned without flicker in the two brass lamps lighting the passageway. At the end was a silver door. Beyond it was another passageway similar to the first. Stepping in, she took a breath of minty air and examined her surroundings. Besides the door she had come through there were two other doors: a matching silver door directly opposite that probably led to the third carriage, and a single door half-way down the passage on the right. All no doubt composed from energy.
The Ghost Engine Page 7